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Companion: Mental Health Mobile Applications for Students
Abstract
In this time and age, mental health and technology plays a big role in society. The app Companion is a mental health app which targets students during their struggle in life, where they may feel there is no one to talk to and no one to reach for help. The app aims to be a safe place for students to pour their thoughts and feelings out as they consult with qualified doctors. In this work, we provide a brief overview of the often overlooked issue in our society regarding mental health, especially during adolescence phase of student life. Companion app is built with students as its main community of interest while focusing on simplicity and long-term usability. The User Interface is built using Figma, turned into a real application without coding through the Bravo Studio platform, and integrated to a firebase realtime database with Airtable. We hope our app could make a safe space for students to lighten their pressure in life and help them heal their mental health.
... The research addresses combining Massive Open Online Courses along with classroom flipping assets for a better standard of instruction and using WeChat websites alongside associated internet pages to encourage mental well-being. Lim et al. [5] emphasize how difficult it may be to maintain one's mental well-being through adolescence, an issue that's frequently overlooked. The proposed Buddy application uses Firebase along with Airtable for storage capabilities whilst building its UI with Figma along with Bravo Studio to incorporate straightforwardness and durability. ...
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to illustrate the development and testing of an innovative mobile application using design-based research.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper reports on the process of transformation of existing printed course material into digitized content through design-based research where design, research and practice were concurrently applied through several iterations of the mobile application. For this transformation, one session each from BSc in Nursing, Bachelor of Pharmacy and Bachelor of Medical Laboratory Sciences was selected. In the first phase of the design-based research, the main research question was formulated. In the second phase, a mobile learning application (OUSL MLearn) was designed and developed to address the research question. In the third phase, this application was evaluated by five groups of stakeholders: content experts to validate the content; educational technologists to check the alignment of technical and pedagogical features; novice users to check the overall effectiveness of the application; developer to develop the application, to check the ease of usage; and researchers to identify the impact of this innovation. These stakeholders were closely involved throughout the whole process which lasted over a period of four months. At the end of this development phase, the results were reflected upon and used for further enrichment.
Findings
It was observed that the developed mobile application was accessible, appealing and pedagogically constructive for users. However, optimization, development time, technical and organizational issues, workload of academics and production costs were identified as major challenges.
Research limitations/implications
This study was based on the findings of a small sample of potential users.
Practical implications
The findings have implications for designing culturally adaptive interactive mobile applications.
Originality/value
This study will benefit practitioners to design culturally sensitive mobile learning courses and researchers to conduct design-based research.
Aims and method
This article examines mental health disorders as individuals transition from adolescence to adulthood. Data were collected from clinical records of patients who had transitioned from child and adolescent mental health services to adult mental health services in a region in South Wales. Demographics and clinical diagnoses under both services were recorded. Patterns between adolescent and adult disorders as well as comorbidities were investigated using Pearson's χ ² -test and Fisher's exact test.
Results
Of the 98 patients that transitioned from one service to the other, 74 had changes to their diagnoses. There were 164 total changes to diagnoses, with patients no longer meeting diagnostic criteria for 64 disorders and 100 new disorders being diagnosed. Comorbidity increased in adulthood.
Clinical implications
Diagnoses can evolve, particularly during adolescence and early adulthood. Therefore regular reassessment is paramount for successful treatment.
Declaration of interest
None.
This paper designs an Internet of Things system (called JustIoT) which is mainly divided into four parts; back-end Google Firebase real-time database, front-end SPA (Single Page Application) web monitoring program (including mobile monitoring App), controller software-hardware, and intelligence server that support MQTT connection and condition control.
JustIoT receives data from all kinds of controllers, allowing users to set the control rules and remote monitoring and control. JustIOT distinguishes users from managers, vendors, customers, registrants, and visitors. Users can build applications in the above system, to serve customers, and to run a business.
In the JustIoT, management web page based on Angular front-end technology is connected to the Firebase real-time database. The event of data modification of Firebase database can trigger Angular's two-way data binding to achieve Three-way data binding effect to implement server-less architecture easily. The data in Firebase database is read and written by the front-end devices (web apps, mobile apps, and controllers) directly.
The intelligence server is an MQTT server that supports the connections of relatively weak embedded controllers such as the Arduino controller. The intelligent server can be considered as an intermediary between the Firebase real-time database and weak controllers, which performs the transfer of data and remote commands.
This study aimed to examine smartphone use patterns, smartphone addiction characteristics, and the predictive factors of the smartphone addiction in middle school students in South Korea. According to the Smartphone Addiction Proneness Scale scores, 563 (30.9%) were classified as a risk group for smartphone addiction and 1261 (69.1%) were identified as a normal user group. The adolescents used mobile messengers for the longest, followed by Internet surfing, gaming, and social networking service use. The two groups showed significant differences in smartphone use duration, awareness of game overuse, and purposes of playing games. The predictive factors of smartphone addiction were daily smartphone and social networking service use duration, and the awareness of game overuse.
Drawing on the rational addiction framework, this study explores the digital vulnerabilities driven by dependence on mobile social apps (e.g., social network sites and social games). Rational addicts anticipate the future consequences of their current behaviors and attempt to maximize utility from their intertemporal consumption choices. Conversely, myopic addicts tend toward immediate gratification and fail to fully recognize the future consequences of their current consumption. In lieu of conducting self-report surveys or aggregatelevel demand estimation, this research examines addictive behaviors on the basis of consumption quantity at an individual level. To empirically validate rational addiction in the context of social app consumption, we collect and analyze 13-month, individual-level panel data on the weekly app usage of thousands of smartphone users. Results indicate that the average social app user conducts herself in a forward-looking manner and rationally adjusts consumption over time to derive optimal utility. The subgroup analysis, however, indicates that substantial variations in addictiveness and forward-looking propensities exist across demographically diverse groups. For example, addictive behaviors toward social network sites are more myopic in nature among older, less-educated, high-income groups. Additionally, the type of social app moderates the effects of demographic characteristics on the nature of addictive behaviors. We provide implications that policymakers can use to effectively manage mobile addiction problems, with the recommendations focusing on asymmetric social policies (e.g., information- and capacity-enhancing measures).
Objective This study aimed to explore utilisation of a 'healthy reading' service and to offer further insight into improving the processes and uptake of book prescribing so that more people have the opportunity to access this treatment.Method Semi-structured interviews with librarians and prescribers. Collection of routine library data.Results The scheme was thought to have been well organised, and borrowings by library users were high. A prescription was presented for 17% of borrowings. Health professionals who already used bibliotherapy in their practice were particularly positive about the scheme. There is potential to increase prescribing from other health professionals, especially general practitioners (GPs). Barriers to use included remembering the service, lack of knowledge about resources, concerns that patients would find resources difficult to use, and the time required within the consultation.Conclusion This research showed that the healthy reading scheme provided a useful treatment option for patients with mild mental health problems and was also well used by library members. Regular reminders about the service and training for prescribers have the potential to increase patient access to resources. Further research is required to determine whether this model of bibliotherapy meets the needs of users of healthy reading materials in accessing the service.Healthy reading has a place in stepped care models for improving mental health at both community and primary care levels. As well as being used as an adjunct therapy it could, in some cases, be an alternative to antidepressant prescribing and help reduce waiting lists for more staff-intensive psychological therapies.
Rapid application development (RAD) is an approach to information systems (IS) development which is much discussed in the practitioner literature. However, there is comparatively little research data on this topic. This paper forms a report of the results of a multi-disciplinary research project which has been studying this development approach for the last three years. The paper discusses seven case studies of RAD projects and compares each to issues relating to a number of RAD principles as represented in methodologies such as the recent open standard known as dynamic systems development method. We conclude with a discussion of a number of important questions relating to further research on RAD.
Scenarios (Use cases) are used to describe the functionality and behavior of a (software) system in a user-centered perspective. As scenarios form a kind of abstract level test cases for the system under development, the idea to use them to derive test cases for system test is quite intriguing. Yet in practice scenarios from the analysis phase are seldom used to create concrete system test cases. In this paper we present a procedure to create scenarios in the analysis phase and use those scenarios in system test to systematically determine test cases. This is done by formalization of scenarios into statecharts, annotation of statecharts with helpful information for test case creation/generation and by path traversal in the statecharts to determine concrete test cases.